He finally catches on and slides in, scanning the room. I can tell the instant he sees the Rebel Raiders. His face blanches, making his chin strap seem even darker.
“Fuck.” He reaches under the table real slow. He’s easing a knife out of an ankle holster. “You call Dizzy?”
“Yeah.” Fay-Lee checks her phone. “He’s coming with the guys from the clubhouse.”
Nickel won’t be coming, then. It’s Saturday, and he’s working. I’m relieved. I think. I don’t want him killing anyone, and if this goes south, he will. But still, I’m scared as shit, and I want him. For some reason, my brain still sees him as my pit bull, my personal loaded gun.
Damn, why did I go along with this? Heavy told all of us we need to play it smart, travel together, stay close to home. I totally would have—I’m not a rebel in the slightest—but Fay-Lee didn’t seem worried, and she’s an old lady. I figured she’d know if shit was seriously serious.
Besides, I desperately needed a break from Nickel Kobald and dental hygiene. All week, I’ve been struggling. Class goes too fast, and there’s no one I can ask for help. I can’t raise my hand as much as I need to ‘cause if I did, I’d look like an idiot. I can’t hardly follow the teacher at all. She’ll start saying something, and then she talks about a patient she had back in the day, and I’m lost.
And Nickel…I have no idea what’s going on in that man’s head. I know for a fact he switched shifts with Forty on Tuesday and last night so we’d work together. He didn’t try to talk to me, but I kept catching him staring at me. And not when I was on stage, either, but like, when I was brushing out my hair in the locker room. Or when I was reading that fucking textbook that both makes no sense and also keeps saying the same thing over and over. He didn’t even try to act like he wasn’t looking.
By the weekend, I needed a drink in the worst way, so when Fay-Lee suggested we head up here, I was game. So that’s why I’m gonna die. ‘Cause school sucks and boys are confusing. What am I, sixteen?
“How far out are they?” I ask.
Fay-Lee checks her phone, scrolls down. “Forty-five minutes.”
“What’s Dizzy sayin’? He gonna kill you?”
A shine appears in Fay-Lee’s dark brown eyes. Oh, shit. Is she gonna cry?
“He says he loves me. That I made his world when I—” She sniffles. “When I said I’d be his old lady.”
Somehow, I know that isn’t exactly what he texted, but it ain’t my business.
“Oh, shit,” I whisper. This is bad. Dizzy should be ripping her a new asshole, and he’s giving her last words type shit? We’re in real trouble.
Roosevelt’s grip tightens on his knife. “If they come over, when I stand, you girls go under the table. Fay-Lee, your keys in your hand?”
“Yup.”
I see now it was stupid to seat Roosevelt between us. He’s pinned in.
We sit there in silence, Fay-Lee and Roosevelt sipping their beers. I can’t get anything past the lump in my throat. I don’t know why the beef between Steel Bones and the Rebel Raiders began, but I know it goes way back, and every so often, like the past few months, it erupts. It’s been fairly quiet since Heavy became president and focused the club on construction and the other businesses, so I don’t really remember things getting real ugly, but my ma tells stories.
Hobs taking a baseball bat to the skull. Crista…what happened to Crista. Scrap came home not long ago for the dime bid he did on the back of that shit.
And now, the Rebel Raiders are riding again. They trashed a Steel Bones Construction work site, and then they sent two assholes to toss The White Van. Nearly broke Cue’s heart when he had to put out two thousand on repairs. He’d wanted to give Trudy a raise.
The door swings open, disrupting my chain of thought, and my gaze flies up, hope in my heart. It hasn’t been long enough to be Dizzy and the brothers, but I can’t handle waiting for the other shoe to drop.
The man who enters isn’t Steel Bones, but he is familiar. He’s got Nickel’s sharp cheekbones, and his hard expression, but he’s older. The top of his head is shiny, and when he gives a chin jerk to the Rebel Raiders in greeting, I can see he’s got a full neck tattoo.
It’s Nickel’s brother. Ike. The one he warned me away from. He sits down at the bar, talking a mile a minute, but unlike the Raiders who respond without peeling their eyes from the game, Ike’s gaze is darting all around the place.
My body freezes, and I grip the mace so tight it slips in my sweaty palm.
Fay-Lee whispers, “What?”
I don’t dare say. Ike’s eyes have found my rack. They linger there, and I can’t help the flush that turns my chest bright red. He smirks. And then, eventually, he looks up, and his gaze sweeps to Roosevelt and then to Fay-Lee. His eyebrows raise, and he smirks so wide, I can’t believe the Raiders don’t notice.
I know what Nickel said, but I shake my head, ever so slightly, begging him with my eyes not to say anything. He winks at me—fuckin’ winks—and he slips out his phone, texts or searches something, and then he spins around and slaps the counter to get the bartender’s attention. The relief leaves me shaking.
“Do we know him?” Fay-Lee whispers.
“Ike Kobald. Nickel’s brother.”
“He a Rebel Raider?” Roosevelt asks, his jaw clenching. The stress is getting to him. He smelled like Acqua di Gio when we came in, but now he smells like armpits.
“I don’t think so. I think he’s just a hang-around. Nickel says stay away from him.”
“No problem.” Roosevelt smiles through the nerves.
We go back to staring at each other and the table, trying not to startle every time the door opens or someone walks toward us. We’re sitting right next to the jukebox and the quarter machine, so there’s a bit of traffic.
It’s torture. Even though I haven’t touched my beer, I have to pee so bad. I’m too afraid to move, though. I try to distract myself, think about dental hygiene class, but that puts me even more on edge.
“Time check?” I whisper to Fay-Lee.
“Ten. Maybe fifteen minutes left.”
I’m thinking we can do this, that it’ll be another crazy story to tell around the bonfire at the clubhouse, when shouts ring out in the bar and boots stomp the hardwood floors. I nearly piss myself.
“Ten to six, motherfuckers!” A deep voice booms, and a few scattered claps punctuate the excited chatter that grows as chairs scrape and people stand and stretch.
Fay-Lee exhales. “The game’s over.”
Our relief is quickly eclipsed by panic. The Rebel Raiders are standing, and they’re making their way toward us. Oh, shit.
“They’re just gonna get quarters for the pool table,” Fay-Lee hisses. “Act natural.” She gives me an enormous fake smile and blinks like she’s got a lash in her eye.
“Remember,” Roosevelt says. “Go under the table.”
But when it happens, it happens so quick, there’s no time. One minute, the three bikers—a fat guy in a red do-rag, a skinny guy with a weird white eye, and a guy with two tear tattoos on his left cheek—are filing toward us, followed by Ike Kobald. Then the skinny guy elbows the fat one, points at Fay-Lee, and says, “That’s Dizzy Jones’ bitch.”
“What did Knocker say?”
“Two large.”
“Ca-ching,” the man with the face tattoo says, and then there’s a clatter, hands on me, and then I’m in the air, the mace slipping from my hands. I drop like a sack of potatoes. A boot toe catches me in the stomach while the Raiders drag Roosevelt from the booth, stomping his wrist into the floor until he screams and drops his knife.
The skinny guy wrestles Fay-Lee to her feet by her hair, and the Raiders muscle Roosevelt and Fay-Lee across the floor and down the hall toward a back exit. I’m on my ass, gasping for breath, my hands scrabbling on the sticky floor, and Ike Kobald looms over me, chuckling.
“You should stay down.” He stares down at me, flipping a toothpick in his mouth.
My
gaze darts wildly around the bar, searching for a friendly face, anyone who can help, but no one will meet my eye. Ike Kobald just stands there, his arms crossed over his chest, smirking, flipping that toothpick.
My purse is under the table. The mace has rolled all the way under the bench. Roosevelt’s knife is on the floor, a foot away.
Ike must notice the second I see it because he goes to kick it, but I’m quicker and closer. I grab it, and I bounce to my feet. I don’t know what to do, but they’ve got my best friend, so I make a mad dash after them.
Ike Kobald’s hand wraps around my forearm, grinding the bones together. I whimper. He puts pressure on my arm, forcing me to bend into a squat, and he looms, leering.
“You should sit back down, girlie.”
“They have my friends.”
He laughs, and ice trickles down my spine. He has Nickel’s voice, his face, his eyes, but it’s like whatever makes them alive in Nickel is dead and rotten in this man. I expect him to hit me, but he lets me go.
“You’re dumb as shit, aren’t you? Well, don’t let me get in your way, then. Go for it.”
He laughs again, and it’s not a cartoon villain laugh, it’s worse than that. He’s truly amused. He thinks I’m running off to get raped or murdered, and he thinks it’s funny. I bolt for the back, grab my purse, and it’s actually not as scary as it was, ‘cause I’m more scared now of what’s at my back than what’s ahead of me.
CHAPTER 10
NICKEL
My phone chirps. It's Ike. In an instant, I'm dashin to Cue's office, grabbin' his keys.
3 Rdrs at Twgys 1 SB & Dzzys btch & blnde btch w tits No blod yt but its comin theres a bounty
My phone chirps. It’s Ike. In an instant, I’m dashing to Cue’s office, grabbin’ his keys.
Blonde bitch with tits. That’s Story. My Story-girl. A red roar of terror and rage swamps my mind.
“What the fuck, brother?” Cue follows me.
“Emergency,” I tell him. “I need your car.” My bike is fast, but on sharp turns, I can pull more speed out of the Mustang. Twiggy’s is out in the boondocks. I need four wheels.
Adrenaline spikes through my limbs, and as I kneel in front of Cue’s safe, I have to shake my fingers lose before I spin the combination lock. He keeps a piece or two in here, and I need more than the 10+1 rounds in my Glock. As I’m opening the safe with one hand, I’m dialing Heavy with the other. He answers on one ring.
“You’ve heard.” His freaky-low voice is calm, and as it always does, it beats back the madness stoked in my brain, giving me room to think. Cue crowds in behind me. He takes the Smith and Wesson from the safe and loads it with his steadier hands. I’ve never been so grateful for my brother.
“Ike texted.”
“Our information is three Raiders up at Twiggy’s. They haven’t made our people yet, but it’s probably a matter of time.”
“Are you moving?” As I ask, I’m taking the gun from Cue, tucking it in the small of my back, and jogging for the parking lot.
“Already in motion. I’ve got Dizzy, Forty, Charge, the prospects. Fourteen men. ETA forty-two minutes.”
That’s too fuckin’ long. Anything could happen in forty-two minutes.
“Don’t we have anyone closer?” I’m peeling onto the road, fingers clenched on the steering wheel.
“It’s in Bumfuck.”
“They have Story?” Say no. Say no. Jo-Beth is blonde besides the purple streaks. So’s Angel when the mood strikes her.
“Yeah. Seems Fay-Lee got a wild hair and took her girl with her.”
“Stupid. Stupid.” Pictures are flashin’ in my head, like at the end of an old school filmstrip. My stomach knots, and I try to accelerate but my boot is already to the floor. “Which prospect?”
“Roosevelt.”
The one with her that night at the clubhouse. Petty jealousy beats at my ribs, but my brain clings to this information like a life raft. He’s into her. He ain’t gonna run; he ain’t gonna let her get hurt.
“Anything else from Ike?” Heavy asks.
I glance down at my phone on the passenger seat. Nothing.
“No, brother.”
“Call if you get more information.”
“Right.” I pull up to a red light, and I strain forward, inching, my muscles burning from the effort of holding back. Cars are comin’ too fast to run it. My heart’s beatin’ so hard, it echoes in the cab.
“And Nickel?”
“Yeah, yeah.” Green! I slam on the gas.
“Your girl’s gonna need you steady.”
We ain’t never talked about it, but I’m not surprised Heavy sees the way of things. I always thought he was made as big as he is so as to fit his monster brain.
“If she’s hurt—” I can’t hardly say it, but it needs said. “If there’s one hair out of place on her head, I’m callin’ chaos.”
“That’s a given.”
The reluctance that pissed Cue off so much after the attacks on the site and the club is gone. Whatever angle Heavy was workin’, tryin’ to negotiate with Knocker Johnson, he’s done with it now. The Rebel Raiders are a clear threat to our women now. Blood will flow.
“If she’s hurt bad—” The words stick in my throat. “You need to knock me out or somethin’. Keep me away. She don’t need to see me like this.”
There’s silence on the line. I can hear Forty barkin’ orders in the background. My entire body feels like it’s going to combust into an inferno of panic and rage.
“That ain’t gonna be what she needs.” Heavy sighs. “You’re gonna have to level up real quick, brother. No losin’ it.”
A wave of impotent fury crests over me, suffocating, buffeting my control and draggin’ me under. I need bones to crunch under my fists. I need to take the flesh and blood that caused this and pulverize it into dust and mud.
Heavy sighs again. “See you in thirty.”
“Thirty,” I repeat.
I vibrate in my seat, drum the dash, rock my hips as if I can urge the car faster.
Story’s so fuckin’ small. She has the curves and all, but the rest of her is so fragile. What the fuck is she doin’ at a roadhouse out in nowhere? All the girls got the talk from Heavy.
It’s fuckin’ Fay-Lee’s fault. I swear that girl put her up to flashin’ her titties at me at that picnic back in the day. My memory offers up an image amid all the churning gore. Story in the bathroom, her bikini top hanging to her waist, and her big eyes hypnotizing me, a mischief-makin’ smile curving those sweet, pink lips.
I didn’t mean to say anything but “Get the fuck out.” I knew she had a thing for me. I wasn’t stupid. But I also thought she was a kid, that she’d take a hint, move on to the next brother. But she was so beautiful. So perfect. This giggling, wide-eyed, sneaky little thing with no fear, no darkness to her at all.
I beat my fists on the steering wheel, and when I feel a slight give, I have to pull back with all the force I have in me. I can’t break the fuckin’ car.
I don’t know how, but I wrestle myself in check. I ain’t got no room in my mind for light anymore, though. The ugly spits up pictures like it always does, stoking the fires, beating me down until I follow it off the ledge.
Me wailing on Keith, slamming him into a wall, over and over. Ma’s hand touchin’ my arm so gentle, and then her cry when my elbow drives into her jaw. Her hands flying up to her face, but keeping her eyes glued to mine.
“It’s okay, Johnny You didn’t mean it. I know you didn’t mean it.” The blood on her teeth.
I see Story’s sweet face, beaten, bloody. Acid burns my throat. I know what might be waiting for me.
I know how many pieces a human can break into.
I know what men can do to women, and I can only hurtle forward, my lips moving in prayer, no sound coming out.
CHAPTER 11
STORY
When I bust through the screen door, the sun is blinding. It’s almost five o’clock, but it’s real dim in the b
ar, and it takes a minute for my eyes to adjust. Screams ring out, and I can’t wait, so I run half-blind through the high grass behind the parking lot, pumping my arms to catch up.
Fay-Lee is flat on her back, kicking and twisting as the skinny guy with the weird eye tries to drag her toward a truck parked way in the back. He stops to slap her, and she jolts up, headbutting him. He kicks her in the ribs, and she howls in pain, but at least he’s not dragging her now.
Roosevelt is worse off. The two other guys are taking turns on him, and he’s so far gone, he’s staggering from one to the other, hugging onto them like a boxer in the middle of a fight.
I see the fat guy register me, but he doesn’t even bother to turn. He doesn’t think I’m a threat.
Am I? I fight to calm my breath and tighten my grasp on the knife with a sweaty hand, my grip slippery.
Fay-Lee screams again, and I stop, gazing wildly back and forth. Am I strong enough to stab through the leathers the guys are wearing? And if I only get one shot, where should I take it—the neck? the side? Do I go for Fay-Lee or Roosevelt?
I need to be smart here, and I’ve never felt so dumb.
Fay-Lee’s eyes lock on mine. She screams, “Run, Story!”
The men beating on Roosevelt look up, and I see it. A floor pathway. The field is a stage, and I see the movement phrase. The choreography.
I don’t think, I just run, straight at the fat man, and the moment before I collide into him, I leap into a barrel roll turn, flinging my arm wide, past the fat man’s grasping hand, and I flip the knife and slide the handle into Roosevelt’s open palm.
Roosevelt reads my mind, and he shouts, springs forward, and sinks the knife into the shoulder of the man with the tear tattoos. Blood spurts from the wound, splattering Roosevelt’s face. The man grunts in pain, and drops to his knees, trying to staunch the blood. He’s not dead, but he’s hurt. Bad.
The fat man hurls me off of him, and this time, I land hard. My ass bounces when I hit the ground and my teeth snap together.
“Okay, okay.” Roosevelt crouches, shifting from foot to foot. “Come on then, motherfucker.”
Nickel's Story: A Steel Bones Motorcycle Club Romance Page 9